“I’ve lost quite a bit of weight but I don’t like that. I’d like to put on half a stone if I’m honest.

TEAM: Amelle with her partner Doug Fordyce [BBC]

“I’ve noticed changes in my body and everything’s tightened up. But I don’t want to lose my curves – my bum has to stay exactly how it is”

Amelle Berrabah

“I’ve also got some serious back muscles, which is a bit too much. I just don’t want to look like a man!”
Tumble kicks off tomorrow and Amelle will compete alongside celebs including singer Sarah Harding, 32, Towie’s Lucy Mecklenburgh, 22, and Steps star Ian “H” Watkins, 38.
Already there have been a slew of injuries with Mr Motivator forced to pull out of the show after hurting his knee and Amelle suffering a nasty ankle injury.
And she admits it is hard to get over the fear of hurting herself when she attempts the tricky gymnastic moves.
She says: “I’ve had some mad thoughts and visions of smashing my face like something out of You’ve Been Framed.
“Doing a cart-wheel on the beam was very daunting. You practise it on lines on the floor beforehand to work it all out.
“But it’s a mental thing for me – going headfirst towards a narrow beam which you could fall off and hit your head. You have to get over the fear and stop imagining horrible things.”

IN FINE SHAPE: Amelle has already lost weight in training but hopes she can keep her curvaceous bum [JEANY SAVAGE] The Hampshire-born star is partnered with professional gymnast Doug Fordyce, 24, who was previously a member of Britain’s Got Talent 2010 champs Spelbound.
The gymnastic routines force the pair to get up close and personal – so how has Amelle, who has a long-term boyfriend, found it? She admits: “It was a shock to realise how physically close we’d be.
“The first time we did our floor routine, he told me to kick up into a handstand and the next thing I know he’s grabbed me and my head is near his crotch.
“I was like: ‘Oh my God, oh my God!’ But you have to forget about that because you have to think about what you’re doing.
“I’ve got a boyfriend so there won’t be any romance for me but I can see how it happens. If you have that connection and you’re with that person every day, I can totally understand how some people have fallen in love.
“I’d be lying if I said it didn’t take a minute for my boyfriend to get his head around it as it’s strange seeing your partner being held by another man in such close contact.”
The floor routine Amelle has learned certainly sounds gruelling – with one move called the Back Breaker.
“All the gymnasts call it that because if you make one wrong move, that’s what can happen,” she says.

MIND OVER MATTER: Gymnastics is all about putting fear to the back of your minds, says the pop babe [JEANY SAVAGE] “I do a cartwheel so I’m hanging upside down and holding onto Doug’s waist. My head’s in between his legs. He then goes backwards into a crab and then I come up and pick him up and I go into a crab and we continue like that. It looks amazing but it’s very hard.”
Away from Tumble, Amelle says she’s not sure whether the Sugababes, which also feature Heidi Range, 31, and Jade Ewen, 26, have a future, but if it is really over, she hopes to go out with one final hurrah.
“It would be nice to say one final goodbye with an album or at least something to mark it,” she says.
“I don’t know myself what’s going on so I’m just focusing on other things.”
One of those other things is her solo career, and Amelle is shortly to release her new single Summertime.“My whole life in the band, I’ve always been steered and told where I’m supposed to be going,” she says.
“It took me a while to find out what I wanted to do. And this single ended up being a very jazzy, reggae, summer song that should make you smile. I actually wrote it about my sister and no-one really noticed.
“It’s a very dear song to me. This is genuinely me and what I do. I’m not trying to be anyone else, and I don’t think you should lie to an audience.
“In the Sugababes you are unknowingly moulded a certain way. I remember being told not to smile quite a lot. But I actually smile very regularly. I don’t want to play that game any more.”
Tumble starts tomorrow on BBC One at 6.30pm. Amelle’s single Summertime is out next month.

About Me

Followers

The Jade Ewen Story so far...

Jade Almarie Louise Ewen (born 24 January 1988) is an English singer, songwriter, actress and member of the Sugababes. Ewen began her singing career in the girl group Trinity Stone signed to Sony BMG in 2005, but they disbanded in 2007 with no album released. In 2009, she represented the UK at the 2009 Eurovision Song Contest performing the Andrew Lloyd Webber / Diane Warren penned "It's My Time" after winning the UK national selection. She achieved 5th place, cementing her as the most successful British Eurovision act since 2002. She replaced Keisha Buchanan in the Sugababes in September 2009, while at the time still signed to Polydor Records.

Ewen was born and brought up in Plaistow, London, to a Jamaican mother, Carol and a Scottish-Sicilian father, Trevor. Trevor is blind and partially deaf, while Carol is partially blind. Ewen was a carer to both her parents and two younger siblings, Shereen and Kiel.She received a scholarship to the Sylvia Young Theatre School. As a student at Sylvia, she appeared in The Bill, Casualty and Mr. Harvey Lights a Candle.Ewen also won the part of Nala in The Lion King at the West End at the age of twelve. Ewen appeared in the children's dance DVD, entitled How To Dance. She also featured briefly in the video for pop rock band Busted's "What I Go to School For".

Between 2003 and 2004 she appeared in the Australian series Out There. In 2005, Ewen became a member of the girl group Trinity Stone which was signed to Sony BMG. The group disbanded in 2007. She later recorded with rapper Kwamé, who was impressed with her work on MySpace. She released a digital single, "Got You" in 2008 under Kwame's Make Noise label. Ewen co-wrote the song "A Little Bit" for the girl group Booty Luv and also "Let Me Be Me" for Jessica Mauboy. In early 2009, Ewen acted in the first episode of the series, Myths.

In January 2009, Ewen was approached and participated in the UK national selection for the Eurovision Song Contest 2009. She was eventually selected to represent the UK with the song "It's My Time" composed by Andrew Lloyd Webber who accompanied her on piano onstage. Ewen was signed with Polydor Records in February and began working on her debut album. In May Ewen finished in fifth place, the highest placing for the United Kingdom since 2002.

In September 2009, it was announced that Ewen had joined the Sugababes as the replacement for Keisha Buchanan.While her second single, "My Man" had been released in the same week, promotional activities for the single were cancelled. Although the single still managed to reach #35 in the charts. In an interview with the BBC, Ewen confirmed her commitment to the Sugababes as her main priority and that her solo album was put on hold. "About a Girl" later debuted at number eight in the UK. Sweet 7 was released in early 2010 after multiple delays from late 2009, and charted at #14 on the UK albums chart. In late 2010 Jade was revealed as the new face of Miss Ultimo lingerie, modelling the lingerie fashion lines Autumn/Winter collection for 2010.

A Brief History of The Sugababes

Sugababes are an English pop girl group based in London, consisting of members Heidi Range, Amelle Berrabah and Jade Ewen. The Guinness Book of World Records have named the Sugababes as the most successful female act of the 21st century with six UK number one singles and eighteen UK top ten hits.

Sugababes were formed in 1998 by founding members Siobhán Donaghy, Mutya Buena and Keisha Buchanan. In 2001, after just one album and some initial success, Donaghy departed and the introduction of Range in the same year was met with the commercial success. The group survived a second line-up change in December 2005, when Buena left the band and was subsequently replaced by Berrabah. In September 2009, it was confirmed that after eleven years in the band, Buchanan was no longer part of the group and had been replaced by Jade Ewen.